Siva Sankar Baba, the founder of Sushil Hari International School in Kelambakkam, has reportedly been arrested from Delhi by the Chennai CB-CID, which is probing allegations of sexual abuse of students at the school.
The self-styled godman stands accused of sexually abusing students and three FIRs had been filed at Chengalpattu Police Station after allegations surfaced against him.
Siva Sankar Baba had reportedly been admitted to a hospital in Dehradun in Uttarakhand for a heart operation. After being discharged, he came to Delhi, which is where he was arrested.
Siva Sankar Baba was arrested by the Chennai CB-CID and is likely to be taken to a local court to get transit remand. He will be brought to Tamil Nadu and then the investigation will begin against him.
He is likely to be produced before a magistrate in Tamil Nadu for his custody hearing. Meanwhile, another team from the CB-CID is conducting investigations at his residence in Kelambakkam in Chennai.
When the allegations surfaced against Siva Sankar, three separate FIRs had been filed in connection with the allegations at the All-Women’s Police Station, Mamallapuram, and a police officer of the Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) rank had been designated as the Investigating Officer in the case.
The FIRs have been filed under several sections of the Prevention of Children against Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and under the Indian Penal Code (IPC), and include sexual assault.
An alumnus of Sushil Hari School had shared with TNM her traumatic account of sexual abuse when she was a student at the school, years ago. She narrated how Siva Sankar made her watch porn on her birthday and forced her to drink alcohol. “He spoke to me for two hours about different sexual techniques and how it’s important to have regular healthy sex with him so that I don’t get sexual thoughts with other boys,” she wrote in a testimony, which is in possession of TNM.
She added that she was told to consider herself a ‘gopika’ in her previous birth and to consider Siva Sankar Baba as ‘Lord Krishna’. Another alumnus, in a written testimony, had accused Siva Sankar Baba of luring girl students to his “lounge” on the pretext of giving gifts to them and then making them watch porn. A third student wrote that the man had sexually assaulted her in his room, after forcing her to drink alcohol. Apart from Siva Sankar Baba, the students had also accused multiple staff members in the school of "bringing" the students to him.
(This story was published on The News Minute and has been published here with permission)
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